Shouth Shore MA opean water swim

Open water race in Boston Harbor – Aug 19

/ Tom Baker / Leave a comment

I just learned that the Save the Harbor/Save the Bay organization is hosting its 1st Annual Swim for Boston Harbor Sunday Aug. 19. It’s a 1-mile competitive (more importantly fun) swim, with wet suit and non-wet suit divisions. It’ll start from the L Street bath house, South Boston. Here’s the website with all the details – www.swim4bostonharbor.org.

It’s a great organization especially for those of us who appreciate the relatively clean and getting cleaner waters in our area. Some of our brave members supported their April Save the Harbor / Save the Bay Cupid Splash. I recall, based on the attire that day, that the conditions were borderline tropical, like most April weekends in Boston. Here’s a photo to help prove it and to bring back those memories.

Like the Cupid event in April, the race in Aug has post-event activities sponsored by Harpoon Brewery with prizes from Jet Blue, my favorite being the best costume/swimsuit (Jane L, that means you).

Upcoming Swims/Save the Date: Aug 12, 2012

/ Tom Baker / Leave a comment

Upcoming Swims:

Weekend swims for July 14th and 15th remain the same – meet around 7:30 AM on Sat. morning and around 7:45/8:00 am Sun. Both days we start from the Southeast end of Nantasket Beach (take your first right into the beach parking lot where you’ll see Beach Fire restaurant). I promise fins casting long 10 foot shadows will remain south of Cape Cod.

Another option for this Sat (July 14) is the Swim Across America one mile swim in Hull starting from the Mary Jeanette Murray bathhouse. It starts at 9:00 am with a post-swim celebration at the Red Parrot. To register or to support a swimmer click here. The Crusty Barnacles has it’s own team this year and it’s looking for more members.

Save the Date

August 12, 2012 is the 2nd Annual Barnacle (Mass) Bay Bash at 7:00 am. This is an approximately three mile fun swim where we plan to have kayaks and paddle boards escorting us from our usual meeting place in Nantasket to Black Rock Beach in Cohasset. We had to change venues from last year’s swim from Black Rock to Sandy Beach and back due to limited parking at BR Beach and very vigilant lifeguards at Sandy (we would pose a liability to the town if we swim in during life-guarding hours).

This is purely a fun swim only and is NOT a race. There are two coves along the way swimmers can stop and either rest at or turnaround from. The early 7:00 am start and day were selected for the 8:00 am high tide on Aug 12, allowing everyone to swim with safe clearance over breakwater rocks on the way there and back that will significantly shorten the swim distance.

Limited edition 2nd Annual Mass Bay Bash shirts will be made available for a nominal price, so RSVP as soon as possible. More details to follow…

Swim Caps

The first run of bright orange, can’t miss you swimming from a mile away, Crusty Barnacle Swim Caps has been depleted and we have had requests for more caps. We’ll be placing a new order shortly, but to help get the most accurate number of caps, email us at swim@crustybarnacles.com if you think you would like another, don’t have one and would be interested in keeping your noggin warm, or you know someone else who just likes to wear bright orange with blue accent caps out and about.

Quote of the Day

“When life gets you down, do you wanna know what you’ve gotta do? Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming”, as spoken by the modern day philosopher extraordinaire/blue fish named Dory from Finding Nemo. I admit I stole this one or perhaps received inspiration for it from the book “Swim” by Lynn Sherr, which I had promised to review but have not yet finished on account of travels with an infant which is a comedy of errors the precludes one from staying focused on any one task greater than 15 seconds. Stay tuned or just go out and get the book (it’s available on those Nooks, Kindle and Ipads if it’s easier, as The Old Colony Library Network was an extended wait-list). But seriously, does swimming not make your day all the better compared to those days you don’t swim?

Lots of Happenings: New Summer Hours…

/ Tom Baker / Leave a comment

Unseasonably warm waters made it a perfect weekend for swimming for the Crusty Barnacles on both Sat and Sun.

Congratulations to everyone who participated in the Cohasset Tri and/or Mile Swim Off. See the photos below (if you have more that you want posted, send them along or if possible upload to the comments section).  Sufficed to say we had a good turnout and even a first place finish in the swim for Andy Strehle.

Too early to predict next weekend, but we are now enacting our new summer hours – this means meeting around 7:30 AM at Nantasket on Sat. morning and around 7:45/8:00 am Sun. Of course, these are merely guidelines and we encourage everyone to show when it’s convenient as there are sure to be swimmers coming or going. Just arrive before 8am, as that’s when the parking lots begin charging. But no worries if you arrive before 8am and leave your car. They will not charge for parking once you’re inside the gate.

Summer Reading: NPR had an interesting interview today with an author of a new book titled Swim: Why We Love the Water. I can’t speak intelligently about the book, but the interview is worth reading or listening to. here’s the link – http://hereandnow.wbur.org/2012/06/25/swim-lynn-sherr. I’ll post a review if someone else doesn’t beat me to it. For anyone who does swim, I suspect it’ll be something we can all relate to in some way.

Enjoy the week…

Quote for the day: “I’d far rather be happy than right any day.” Douglas Adams

And now some of the photos (reminder: send more if ya got ’em)

Disclaimer: The image with a likeness to Senator Brown may or may not be him and if it were him, which we’re not saying it is, doesn’t swim with us, but he would have an open invitation. That said, this website takes no political position nor does it affiliate itself with any political party, other than as a generalization based on no scientific fact we would venture to say the political leanings of the collective organization are fanatically moderate.